New faculty
Dr. Ana María Navas Méndez is a historical archaeologist interested in the study of colonization processes in Latin America. Her research focuses on the impact of European commodities and the political, social, economic, and symbolic repercussions triggered by the adoption of foreign materials and technologies. She has conducted multidisciplinary projects in Venezuela and Panama analyzing the role of metals and ceramics in the colonization of both regions. Her aim is to contribute new historical narratives that emphasize the agency and resilience of underrepresented communities. Besides teaching and researching, Navas Mendez enjoys gardening and spending time with her husband, Gabriel, and their baby, Sergio.
Navas Méndez was born and raised in Caracas, Venezuela, where she also earned her bachelor’s degree at the Central University of Venezuela (UCV) and her master’s degree at the Venezuelan Institute for Scientific Research (IVIC). In 2014, she moved to the U.S. to join the Ph.D. program in anthropology at the University of Texas at Austin.
As an anthropologist with a focus on archaeology, she participated in different projects in her home country, Mexico, and Panama. In Venezuela, she was part of a research team that collaborated with Indigenous and rural communities to nominate their intangible cultural heritage to UNESCO’s lists. In Mexico, she was an excavation supervisor for a project centered on the transformation of ritual spaces during the colonial period in the Xaltocan community. For her dissertation research, she conducted compositional analysis of ceramics collected in pre-Columbian and colonial Panamanian sites to understand the transformations in the production and distribution of pottery after the European occupation.
After finishing her Ph. D. program, she joined the New College of Florida (NCF) as a visiting assistant professor. Her courses at NCF included Historical Archaeology of Latin America, an introduction to ceramic analysis, Mesoamerican archaeology, and an introduction to archaeometric analysis of archaeological materials. She is excited about joining Illinois State University and hopes her experience contributes to the Sociology and Anthropology Department.
Dr. Gabriel Torrealba Alfonzo is a cultural anthropologist from Venezuela. He obtained his Ph.D. from Southern Illinois University Carbondale in 2023, and previously, a master’s degree from the Venezuelan Institute for Scientific Research (2012) and a bachelor’s from the Central University of Venezuela (2007).
Torrealba’s work explores the political and economic life of Indigenous Peoples from Lowland South America. His main research project examines the politics and poetics of Indigenous media in Peruvian Amazonia. He focuses on the way Kukama media-makers from the Loreto region of Peru use aesthetic mastery to build political power in confronting oil companies and the neoliberal state. By analyzing artistic devices such as hip-hop songs, music videos, audiovisual narrativity, and mural art, Torrealba Alfonzo examines how digital and nondigital mediatizations help Indigenous activists to rework and rethink key political spaces in Amazonia such as environmentalism, indigeneity, and historicity.
Torrealba’s second research project takes place in Venezuela. There, he explores the social, cultural, and mytho-historical dimensions of the Tonka Bean political economy in the Orinoco region. Torrealba’s studies the involvement of Indigenous communities such as the Mapoyo people in the extractive economies of southern Venezuela. Within this line of his research, Torrealba has also addressed the intersection between indigeneity and nationalism. Through an examination of the politics of heritage-making in the context of the Bolivarian Revolution, he analyzes asymmetrical relations between Indigenous Peoples and the Venezuelan socialist state. The results of his research in Venezuela have been published in the Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology and the Boletim do Museo Paraense Emílio Goeldi.
In his free time, Torrealba listens to and makes music. His favorite genera are ’80s new wave, jangle pop, shoegaze, dream pop, and post-punk.
Dr. Justin Turner’s academic career started at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, where he received his Ph.D. in criminology with a focus on the theories of crime, inequality, and policing. Over the last seven years, Turner has worked at a number of institutions, from serving as an assistant professor at Morehead State University in Kentucky to a visiting assistant professor position at the University of Massachusetts Boston. This has given him the ability to teach a wide range of courses in sociology and criminology—from punishment and society to crime and media.
Turner’s research and teaching interests center on the broader concepts of control as it materializes at the intersections of policing and governance. Crime and deviance, understood via social theory, round out his research interests. His most recent research activities involve the specific investigation of personal safety apps and the replications of policing on a broader, yet individual scale. Here, the idea that anyone can be the police takes root. The overall goal of this research is to evaluate and plot the trajectory of policing for the 21st century. Turner hopes to expand this research by focusing on the relationship between the security industry and governance, and ultimately its impact on the structures and institutions surrounding us.
A second related research project investigates the interplay between debt and policing—specifically of debt’s relationship to governance as well as the police’s involvement in the enforcement of debt, and subsequent handling of the indebted.
Outside of academia, Turner likes to stay busy by immersing himself in the Bravo universe and Notre Dame football, or trying to garden, all while chasing a curious and destructive toddler.
New staff
Katie Shadid ’22 has joined our department as the new office support specialist. Shadid is a proud Illinois State alumna—she majored in film and digital media and graduated magna cum laude with her bachelor’s degree. She enjoys spending time with her animals and friends as well as listening to music, watching scary movies, traveling, and trying new food.
